Dreams can be phenomenal.
People spend money trying to decipher the meaning of their dreams. They talk to psychics and all sorts of doctors with impressive degrees in impressive fields in hopes of finding the meaning of their dreams. Maybe they’re looking for direction in their lives, as if their dreams and their reality could be intertwined somehow. Back in Old Testament times, some people’s dreams were direct messages from God. Not so much anymore. Not without a straightjacket and a group of mental therapists helping you to see your misguidance, anyway.
Other people believe that dreams are just dreams.
After the kick to my head knocked me out, I opened my eyes and saw light. The sky overhead was a brilliant, vibrant blue with a blinding white light high above. I was lying on my back in the middle of Little B’s backyard. Everything was exactly like I had remembered, and yet so different. It was full of life. The grass was plush and green and soft. Songbirds sang from the surrounding trees and a gentle breeze wrapped me in comforting warmth. The anger I carried with me was gone. I felt at peace.
“You’re a bit early,” a comforting voice said.
I sat upright and looked around. Little B was on her hands and knees digging in the most wondrous flowerbed I ever saw. She looked younger. She looked refreshed and full of energy. She smiled at me and set her tools down and then walked over to me. She moved like a twenty year old.
“Grandma?”
“I know. It’s a bit much to get used to all at once. But you do.” She sat down beside me. “I’m worried about you.”
It was surreal. I knew then that I was dreaming, but nothing seemed like a dream. “What happened?”
“Got your butt kicked, that’s what.”
I remembered the kick. I felt my head for cracks or lumps or blood and found none. I was fine. My confusion turned into a smile.
“Well, the choice is yours.”
“What choice?”
“Same one I had.” She smiled greatly. “I want to think that I made the right choice. I guess time will tell.”
She gave me a look that I didn’t understand just then. I was so happy to see her that I didn’t give much heed to what she was trying to tell me. I looked around at all the beauty as if seeing if for the first time.
“Time’s a ticking,” she said.
I looked back to her. Her smile was gone. “What do I do?”
“It’s your choice, Michael. You can stay if you’d like, but if you decide to go back, it’s going to feel that much worse.” We stared at each other for a moment. She reached over and patted my shoulder. “You want to save the girl. Well, you could go back and try, or you could just let the pieces fall where they may. Rid yourself of all that anger you’re carrying. Let God handle it.”
“I can’t leave her.”
“You just did.”
“I can’t lose her. I can’t lose Palo, like I lost Pamela.”
“You’re losing yourself, Michael. Have you forgotten everything I’ve taught you?” She gave me a firm look. “Let it go. Save yourself.”
“No, I can’t. She needs me and I need to go back.”
“You’ll end up like one of them. Revenge is such an ugly direction, Michael. It’s no way to live. It leads you down.” She paused a moment, then gave an understanding nod. “Go and be what you are going to be, Michael. Remember that God is always with you. Always listening. Always watching.”
I stood up. “I miss you, grandma.”
She rose easily. “Oh, we’ll see each other again, Michael. I have a feeling that you’ll be back soon enough.”
I nodded to her. I felt as if I was making the right choice. She smiled and hugged me tight. “It’s going to get dark now.”
I let her go. “If I stay, will they kill her?”
Little B said nothing. She looked at me as if I already knew the answer. I took a deep breath. “Will they kill me?”
“Don’t trouble yourself with that just now, Michael. Trust in God. It’s the only way.”
Little B walked back to her garden with a smile. I watched her kneel down and grab her small digging tool. I watched her raise it up, then strike it into the brown soil with a loud thundering crunch.
My eyes flashed open with a start. I was bathed in pain immediately, throbbing from my head down into the tips of my toes. My eyes stung with sweat and blood. My hands were taped together at the wrists and my legs at the ankles. I was on my back staring up at Sally’s ceiling. I smelled bacon and eggs right away. It was amazing. I could hear the grease sizzle in the pan. I was starving.
I turned my head to the right. I could make out Palo lying in the same fashion just a few feet away. We were both between the fireplace and the couch. She was motionless, facing the other direction.
“You’re out of ketchup.” Jeff Dimeglio’s voice was deep and gruff.
I turned my head back up in time to see him hovering over me, raising back his right arm, making a hard fist. His eyes shinned and his smile gleamed.
His fingers were marked in Old English letters, though I couldn’t read the tattoos. He was wearing the black sweatshirt with the hood down and I saw that he had long hair. His skin was deeply tan, worse than my own.
“How can you have so much meat with no ketchup?”
His fist raced towards my head. I closed my eyes.
I opened my eyes to the sound of an aluminum digging tool scraping into the dirt beside me. It was loud and powerful.
I sprang upright, again feeling strangely free. Little B was on her knees in the garden staring surprisingly at me. “So soon?”
I shrugged. “Wasn’t by choice.”
Little B’s warm look turned hard. “I told you what the difference between you and them was. You have a choice. Listen to your conscious while you still have one. Wise and toughen up or they will kill you.”
“I won’t give them a chance.”
“You have given them so many chances already! It’s a miracle you made it this far. And you’re all out of second chances, so next time is it.”
“Thanks for the advice.”
“Remember the love that you found and hold on to it tighter than anything else you ever did.” Little B said firmly. “Love is strong.”
I nodded. I waved bye. She did nothing but stare at me hard. I shut my eyes.
My vision slowly came back. The room was bright. The air still smelled of breakfast. I was still taped up and lying on my back. The pain was nearly overpowering. I could taste blood in my mouth and could barely see out of my left eye. I turned my head to look for Palo. She was gone.
The door shut and a floorboard creaked. I heard Jeff Dimeglio huffing and puffing. He had been working hard at something. A vision of him digging a hole filled my head. His breathing closed in on me. I decided to close my eyes. The last thing I needed was to have my face look like pummeled hamburger. I wasn’t that good looking to start with.
Two strong hands grabbed my ankles tight and yanked my legs into the air. Instinctively, I opened my eyes. I found Jeff’s immediately. My mistake. He let go of my legs and moved over-top of me again. He wasn’t happy.
“You should’a just gave me my money. Stupid cop.”
I supposed it wouldn’t do any good to argue that I wasn’t a cop. He bent down close to me, extending his arms towards my face. I closed my eyes again, knowing what was coming. I felt his thick fingers grab ahold of my scalp and raise my head up off the polished tongue-and-groove oak flooring. I was almost upright to a sitting position when the maniac threw my head back down with a driving force into the floor.
Dreams can bring you the worst pain imaginable.
I was in the woods, running hand-in-hand with Pamela, dodging fallen trees and swiping branches out of the way, racing towards the light of the moon. Behind us it came, crashing and rumbling, loud and undeniable. Sweat coated my face, dripping into my eyes, stinging them terribly. The flight through the woods had been long and tiresome. There seemed to be no end. And the bear was closing in on
us more-so with each passing second. We were winded and breathing ragged, sore and beaten, exhausted to the point of collapsing.
I looked back. Massive cedars, elms, and oaks were flattened by the black nightmare sweeping towards us like an avalanche. We couldn’t move fast enough. It was gaining ground. It would tear us to shreds in moments. I could see its white teeth shining in the moonlight. Its jaws snapping viciously at the back of our necks.
I turned forward. Nothing but trees and the full moon.
Pamela began screaming. She was crying hard, begging me to do something, to do anything to save her. But there was nowhere to go. As I risked a second look back, I saw the bear barreling at us, fast and powerful. Death was inevitable.
I squeezed her hand tight, stopped running, and pulled her into my arms. I drew her in close to protect her as I could. I looked down to tell her one last time that I had always loved her. When she looked up to me, I saw that it wasn’t Pamela I was holding. It was Palo.
“You were supposed to save me!” she cried.
The presence of the bear fell down over us.
The loud thud woke me.
Because of my surroundings, I knew the noise had been a car door slamming shut. I was sweating and trembling. My left eye was stinging from blood running into it from the cut on my forehead. I was cramped up, still taped helplessly. It was chilly. The sun wasn’t above the treetops yet. It must have been around 7:00 a.m. I had no idea what had happened to Palo or Sally.
Was Sally even alive? Was Palo just as helpless waiting for me to save her? Did the killer Jeff Dimeglio have plans on driving this car off a cliff?
A thousand thoughts raced through my head, and I had answers to none of them. I couldn’t move. I couldn’t talk. I watched helplessly as Jeff Dimeglio walked around to the back of the car, looked down at me, then slammed the trunk closed, locking with it any hopes of me escaping.
I was in the dark. Cramped and sore. Thirsty and weak. I hurt all over, mentally and physically. I could handle that. What was killing me was not knowing where Palo and Sally Rhode were. With having no way of altering my situation, I decided to sleep, to rest and hopefully gain some strength. I shut my eyes against the intense throbbing in my head and allowed myself to drift.
Jeff abruptly put an end to that.
I heard and felt the car start up. A second later we were moving. Then the radio came on. Rock music, hard beats and crashing cymbals. Then the volume turned way up. I opened my eyes. There would be no sleep, not with the speakers directly above my head, cranking out Metallica. I knew a story where prisoners of war were locked into small areas where hard rock was played, hoping to break their spirits so that they would cooperate and talk and give away secrets or whatever. I thought that was such ignorance. Metallica was my favorite band. The only way to listen to it was loud. As loud as it could get.
I smiled against the duct tape. Things were turning in my favor.
Adrenaline was pumping quickly through my bloodstream. I sang along in my head. I didn’t drift into slumber. I drifted into vengeance. I wasn’t going to sleep. I was going to be ready.
The car stopped and the radio went dead. A door opened, then shut. A second later I heard talking a few feet away. I recognized Jeff Dimeglio’s voice. He was speaking to a Russian man. I then heard the sounds of chains falling and dragging across cement, then a squeaky wheel moving where the chains were. I pictured a chain-linked fence gate with a Russian guard or two. Made sense. We were in the Red Square, after all.
The car door opened then shut again, and the car lurched forward slowly. I think I heard the fence wheel moving again, along with the chains, but I wasn’t certain. I figured we were entering in a secret place, kept under close watch, barricaded with razor wire fence. Probably some killer pit bulls roaming within. It didn’t matter. I was locked in a trunk.
The car turned to the right, I slid with it, and a short distance later the car came to a halt. The engine died. A door opened then closed. A second door, the back door on the passenger side opened with a groan. There was movement in the car. I pictured Jeff crawling inside and picking something heavy up. A body, perhaps. Sally or Palo. The car didn’t shift around terribly, so I knew the body wasn’t heavy. It had to be Palo he was taking out. That left me guessing where Sally was.
The backdoor shut firm. There were muffled Russian voices speaking out of earshot. It was dead quiet otherwise. I lied motionless, waiting.
I closed my eyes and dug deep inside myself. It was now or never. No more second chances. Do or die.
I thought of Pamela. The reason I was here. My body trembled in small violent eruptions of adrenaline. I buried all the proverbs Little B taught me and let my anger consume me.
I wrapped my wings around me then, tight like a blanket. They were black.
Chapter 19